Week of January 8-14

With Breanne (Charles and Melissa's daughter) and Lizzie (Cissy and Solomon's daughter)

What a week! I’m sure that any week beginning a time abroad is one of adventure, mistakes, and culture shock. After packing up from the hotel, Charles picked up Aubrey and we headed out on a four-hour trip to Mbale from Kampala. I couldn’t stop looking at everything and all of the new words plastered to the cement buildings. “Mukwano” (“friendship”) is a common one. As we drove, I asked Charles about everything, from social norms and taboos to the differences in hand gestures, facial expressions, and words. It’s deceiving that they speak English here, because I sometimes forget that I’m still in a culture very different from my own, and I need to be careful to recognize that and hopefully avoid offending anyone. However, I do realize that being a muzungu (white person!) gives me a bit of an allowance to err and learn from it.

It is common to greet someone every day with a handshake and a “hello” (not “hi”!). People usually take the time to stop and ask how you are and I think it is expected that you return the favor. Even on the phone, they hardly ever just say, “Hi, I was calling about….” They always ask how the person is before continuing. They seem more willing to slow down to place more of an emphasis on the people around them.
On Monday, I woke up at 3 a.m. and couldn’t fall back asleep, even though I was hoping to sleep in to get rid of the jet lag. Aubrey and I met with Charles to discuss educational contracts and decide our goals for the semester. I was completely out of it, so after the meeting, I went back to the guest house to lay down.

Later, Jean Kapsner, a visiting nurse from Minnesota, took us to the market to buy fruit and vegetables. It’s a little different than buying perfect carrots in a clear bag at the grocery store! After a trip to the supermarket as well, we struggled down the road with bags in each hand full of pineapples, mangoes, avocados, carrots, potatoes (they call them “Irish” potatoes), and various cheeses and cereals.

Jean gave us an introduction to life at the guesthouse. To have potable water, we must first boil it and then pour it through a filter system (for taste). Washing the dishes involves cleaning with soap and then rinsing in bleach water. We can’t leave anything on the counters, or the ants will almost immediately form a line and come running. We do have hot water and can flush toilet paper; both of these small conveniences are a huge blessing!

After work, we went out to eat Indian food with the Howards, Jean, and Rich, who’s from California and has been working at CURE as an IT/everything guy for the past six months. He’s leaving on Friday to work with Invisible Children in Gulu. The Howards are wonderful and I’m so thankful they’re here and taking care of us. Melissa, Charles’ wife, is actually the sister of Joel Brubaker, a friend from Summer’s Best 2 Weeks. (The world is small!) They have two girls, Elyse (4 years) and Breanne (almost five months).

On Tuesday, we met with Charles again to clarify our goals and discuss our plans. We’ll be at CURE for two months, and then we’ll travel down the road a few miles in March to participate in TASO’s (The AIDS Support Organization) TEACH program for a month. After that, we sat in with the social worker, Miriam, and watched while she did the intakes for the clients. I sat through about four, but only one was conducted in English. There are about 40 languages in Uganda; English and Luganda are the most universal, however. Needless to say, Aubrey and I are working hard on learning Luganda!

It’s interesting to watch the intake, because most of the time the mother is the parent to travel with the sick child (here, we mostly treat hydrocephalus and spina bifida – I’ll write more about that later). Apparently, village women have little say in the household and are often illiterate. Traveling long distances, finding themselves in a strange place, and being told that their baby needs surgery must be very overwhelming. Many of the mothers cry when they are told the problem. We have been told that children with disabilities in the villages are often given names that mean “passing through” or the like. They are expected to be on earth for a short while and then die. Still, some of these mothers really care about their children and anxiously wait while their baby undergoes surgery, but some don’t seem to be very concerned. It’s almost as if they have already given up on the child.

Wednesday was our first real day on the job, since I finally felt that I had moved past the worst of jet lag (which, by the way, is awful!). Rebecca, another social worker, was finally in after a bout of the flu. After sitting with her through a few intakes, we went around to the ward, where the mothers and babies sleep. It smells awful. Think of a team of football players after practice, multiply that a few times, and put them all in a closed room. It’s not anyone’s fault that they don’t have deodorant, and I’m the one that needs to get used to it. It just gives me a headache right now!

There are about 24 beds available. At any given time, there are several babies sleeping on the beds, their poor heads ballooning with hydrocephalus, shining from the stretched skin and veined with large blood vessels. It’s obvious which children have spina bifida because their heads are normal-sized.

Wednesday was a difficult day; I was feeling overwhelmed by the communication disparities, different expectations between Aubrey and me, and a long work day. I went to bed frustrated but recognizing that sometimes things need to be hard so I can appreciate them more and learn in the process.

On Thursday I turned 22, which made me feel old. Oh goodness. But already I was beginning to feel more at home. It’s difficult for me to reach out and touch others with the knowledge that I may get sick or get a rash or something of the like. And I hate that so much. Jesus touched the lepers when no one else would touch them, and these women and babies certainly aren’t lepers! I have been taught my whole life to be extremely careful with germs, etc., and I know I must be wise, but I want to love fully more than being wise. I’m finding a balance, though. I’m careful to wash my hands (and try to be discreet) but also am finding myself more willing (and wanting) to just be with the mothers and babies and love them in any way I can.

It’s been a bit difficult, because Ugandans and Americans communicate so differently. I fear that I’m unintentionally sending the wrong message sometimes. The fact that many of the mothers speak no English is also an extremely large barrier. The English-speaking mothers will translate for us occasionally, but it gets frustrating trying to mime out what I want to say. The “come here” gesture is a bit like waving, and I have had mothers get out of their chairs and walk over when I was just trying to wave! They did not speak English, either, so I tried to mime that they needed to sit down and wait their turn for the lab. Oh, life is so awkward sometimes!
The weekend was wonderful. We met Sam and Emmanuel, two Ugandan medical students volunteering at the hospital, and they took us to the market again as well as Mbale Resort, which was beautiful. We had breakfast at Solomon and Cissy’s, one of the neurosurgeons and his wife, and spent time there with Sam and Emmanuel as well as their four-month-old, Lizzie. I also had the chance to go to Yussef and Nada’s, a Christian Lebanese family, with Melissa, Rich, and Jean. I found myself sitting at the table, looking around at the people I did not know just a week ago and feeling completely at home. I am happy to be here. I know it is not going to be easy, but some parts of it will be. I’m excited to learn all I can.